4 Memoir on the Ancient Coins of Beghrdm. [Jan. 



place, with the fact of the outlines of buildings discoverable beneath the 

 surface, seem not to discountenance the tradition. It is not however 

 improbable that this city, like many others, may owe its destruction to the 

 implacable rage of the barbarous and ruthless Genghiz, who like Attila 

 described himself as the " Ghazb Khudd," or " Scourge of God." That it 

 existed for some time after the Muhammedan invasion of these countries 

 is evidenced by the numerous coins of the Caliphs found on its site. 

 That it ceased to exist at the period of Timu'r's expedition into India, 

 we have negative proof furnished by his historian Shbrifuddin, who 

 informs us, that Timu'r, in his progress from Anderab to Kabul, encamped 

 on the plain of Baran (the modern Bayan, certainly) and that while there, he 

 directed a canal to be cut, which was called Mahighir, by which means, 

 the country, before desolate and unproductive, became fertile and full of 

 gardens. The lands thus restored to cultivation, the conqueror apportion- 

 ed among sundry of his followers. The canal of Mahighir exists at this 

 day, with the same name it received in the time of Timu'r. A considerable 

 village, about one mile west of Beghrdm, has a similar appellation. This 

 canal, derived from the river of Ghorband, at the point where it issues from 

 the hills into the level country, irrigates the lands of Bdydn and Mahi- 

 ghir, and has a course of about ten miles. Had the city of Beghrdm 

 then existed, these lands immediately to the west of it, would not have 

 been waste and neglected, neither would Timu'r have found it necessary 

 to cut his canal, as the city when existing must have been supplied 

 with water from the same source, that is, from the river of Ghorband; 

 and from the same point, that is, at its exit from the hills into the level 

 country ; and the canals supplying the city must have been directed 

 through these very lands of Bdydn and Mahighir, which Timu'r found 

 waste and desolate. The courres of the ancient canals of Beghrdm are 

 now very evident, from the parallel lines of embankments still to be 

 traced. The site of Beghrdm has, to the north, the river formed by the 

 junction of the Ghorband and Panjshir streams, and to the south, the 

 river of Koh Daman ; but neither of these rivers are applicable to the 

 irrigation of the circumjacent soil, the former flowing in low lands, 

 perhaps one hundred and fifty feet below the level of the plain, and 

 the latter scantily furnished with water flowing in a sunken bed. It 

 may be farther noted, with reference to Timu'r's colonization of Mahi- 

 ghir, that the inhabitants of the district of Khwojeh Keddri, while for- 

 getful as to whom their forefathers owed their settlement in this 

 country, acknowledge their Turki descent, and alone of all the inhabi- 

 tants of the Kohistdn speak the Turki language. We might expect 

 to detect a notice of Beghrdm in the Arabian records of the early caliphs, 

 in the histories of the Ghaznavi emperors, and in those of Genghiz 

 Khan. 



